9A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 2016
Smithart: Nearly
$120,000 in room
taxes are owed to city
Continued from Page 1A
Smithart and his com-
pany, Hospitality Masters
LLC, owed the city nearly
$120,000 in room taxes. He
agreed to retire the debt by
paying the city $150 a week
from June through Sep-
tember and $100 a week
from October through May.
According to court records,
Smithart had made 11 of 17
payments through the end of
September.
The City Council autho-
rized Henningsgaard to
obtain the judgment this
month after learning that
Smithart had not responded
Oregon winegrape producers
optimistic about 2016 harvest
to the city’s outreach.
Smithart
could
not
immediately be reached for
comment.
The Port of Astoria,
meanwhile, has filed a breach
of contract lawsuit against
Smithart seeking more than
$400,000 in back rent and
other payments.
Smithart and a busi-
ness partner were awarded
a five-year lease by the Port
in 2012 to operate the for-
mer Red Lion Inn at the
West End Mooring Basin.
But Smithart fell behind on
payments and was forced out
last year after a lengthy bat-
tle with the Port.
By ERIC MORTENSON
EO Media Group
SALEM — Oregon’s vine-
yard and winery operators
are by nature an optimistic,
glass-half-full bunch, and their
assessment of the 2016 harvest
is no exception.
The Oregon Wine Board’s
annual harvest report said the
fruit produced throughout the
state was marked by “won-
derful concentration and com-
plexity with characteristic nat-
ural acidity” despite numerous
quirks in the growing season.
An unusually warm spring
produced a grape bud break
two to four weeks earlier than
normal, and a following hot
spell condensed the flowering
period and caused a smaller
fruit set for most producers,
wine board Communications
Manager Michelle Kaufmann
wrote.
Average conditions pre-
vailed during the summer,
causing smaller berry size but
“a higher concentration of fla-
vors,” according to the Nov. 8
report.
The 2016 vintage produced
“practically immaculate fruit”
with few disease or pest prob-
lems, according to the report.
Yields statewide were a mix
of higher and lower than aver-
age. Crop production was
down slightly in the Willa-
mette Valley but up in South-
AP Photo
Customers walk outside of a Wal-Mart store in San Jose,
Calif. Wal-Mart has picked up its building permits for a new
Supercenter in Warrenton and has started groundwork.
Clatsop
Residents
Against Wal-Mart, a group
formed in 2010 to oppose the
retailer, appealed the Plan-
ning Commission’s approval
to the state’s Land Use Board
of Appeals. The group took
issue with the location of a
truck dock facing Highway
101, a screening wall that
members alleged didn’t meet
city code, too few bike racks
and the lack of a wetlands
permit.
The Board of Appeals
sided with the group, and
remanded Wal-Mart’s appli-
cation back to the city. The
Warrenton City Commission
later approved Wal-Mart’s
application, after the retailer
ern Oregon and Eastern Ore-
gon, Kaufmann said.
The harvest report includes
accounts from growers and
winemakers throughout the
state’s regions. In Eastern Ore-
gon, viticulturist Jason Mag-
naghi of Figgins Family Wines
described the vintage as one of
the most interesting in his 16
years.
Bud break and bloom were
By CHRISTOPHER S.
RUGABER
AP Economics Writer
WASHINGTON — States
that voted for Hillary Clin-
ton in last week’s presiden-
tial election reported stron-
ger job growth in the previous
year than states that supported
Donald Trump, according to
data released by the Labor
Department today.
Large cities in states where
voters were more likely to
support Trump also lagged in
job growth, a separate analysis
by Jed Kolko, chief economist
at Indeed, a job search web-
site, also found. The figures
add credence to the idea that
economic concerns contrib-
uted to Trump’s unexpected
victory.
Eleven U.S. states reported
healthy job gains in Octo-
ber, and the unemployment
rate fell in seven, the Labor
Department said Friday . Thir-
ty-four states reported little
change in employment from
the previous month.
acquiesced on its designs
to meet the citizen group’s
objections.
The group sued the U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers
in U.S. District Court over
the wetlands fill permit the
agency granted Wal-Mart.
The group claimed the Corps
improperly permitted Wal-
Mart to fill the wetlands for
the new store without ade-
quately assessing environ-
mental impacts and available
alternatives. A judge dis-
missed the case in August.
In September, the group
appealed the dismissal to
9th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals. The group’s briefs
in the case are due Jan. 3.
The Corps’ response is due
Jan. 30.
The healthiest gains in the
past year were in so-called
“blue” states: Job growth was
3.5 percent in Washington
state, the biggest gain nation-
wide. Oregon reported the
next largest gain, at 3.3 per-
cent. Other healthy increases
were in Colorado, California
and Nevada.
There were exceptions
to the trend: Florida, which
supported Trump, saw hir-
ing rise 3.1 percent in the 12
months ending in October, the
third-highest total.
But the smallest increases
were in so-called “red” states
that voted for the Republican
candidate. Job growth was
just 0.7 percent in Pennsylva-
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Election: ‘Good possibility’ Lampi
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Continued from Page 1A
Lampi said the latest
update is “no shocker to me.”
“The way I look at it,
basically, nothing in my
life has been a gimme, or
easy, so I didn’t expect it to
change now,” he said with a
chuckle. “I say that kind of
tongue-in-cheek.
“I always had to work for
it,” he said.
Knowing that the results
still aren’t final, he said, “I
guess I’ll just keep the faith
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two weeks early, he reported,
but harvest played out at a
“nice slow pace” that allowed
workers to pick fruit at “per-
fect ripeness.”
“All indications point to a
really exceptional vintage,” he
concluded.
In the Willamette Valley,
Cristom Vineyards owner Tom
Gerrie said his 2016 harvest
was smaller than the previous
two years but close to his his-
torical average of 2 tons per
acre. Variable weather during
flowering resulted in small
berries and clusters that “lead
to depth, intensity and concen-
tration in the young wines,”
he wrote for the wine board
report.
The 2016 vintage “may be
headed toward greatness,” he
said.
In job growth, blue states outpaced red states
Wal-Mart: Retailer
acquiesced on proposed
designs to meet citizen
group’s objections
Continued from Page 1A
Sean Ellis/EO Media Group
Winemaker Martin Fujishin sorts sangiovese wine grapes last week at Koenig Winery
near Caldwell, Idaho. Idaho growers say wine grape yields are up dramatically compared
with last year and slightly above normal when compared with most years.
and keep hoping that it works
out, and hope for a different
result on the 23rd.”
Asked if he’ll run for City
Commission in the future
if the votes don’t go his
way, he said there’s a “good
possibility.”
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nia, 0.9 percent in Ohio and 1
percent in Wisconsin — three
Midwestern states that handed
48 electoral votes to Trump.
And two states lost jobs in
the past year: Wyoming and
North Dakota, which have
been hit by falling oil and coal
prices. They both voted for
Trump.
Overall, the differences
weren’t huge: Job growth in
blue states was 1.7 percent in
the 12 months ending in Octo-
ber, compared with 1.5 per-
cent in red states, according to
Kolko’s calculations.
But there are similarities
in the city data. Six of the ten
metro areas with the slowest
job growth were in Pennsyl-
vania, Ohio and Wisconsin.
Allentown and Scranton, both
in Pennsylvania, lost the most
jobs of any city nationwide.
Nationwide, the economy
picked up in the fall even amid
the contentious presidential
election. Americans ramped
up their shopping and appli-
cations for unemployment aid
fell to a four-decade low, a
sign layoffs are scarce.
That’s prompted steady
hiring, though it has fallen
from last year’s pace. Employ-
ers added 161,000 jobs nation-
wide in October, enough to
reduce the unemployment rate
over time. The rate slipped to
4.9 percent from 5 percent in
September.